The Comet
by ilunga
Summary: The women and girls of the Western Air Temple are excited to see the comet that comes around only once every hundred years.


**A/N - The story of Sozin's Comet and the second-to-last airbender.**

We went outside to watch the comet—there were thousands of girls and women and bison waiting on the grass.

It was a mass exodus.

We grabbed whatever we could find—food and water, musical instruments and toys, and every telescope in the temple—and left. We were going to have a celebration. I sat with Ninang Riza, who was young and kind but already had her arrows. I was only twelve, but she treated me as an equal. We shared a telescope as we waited for the comet, lying on our bellies and spying on the Fire Nation town across the fields.

There was a legend, back then, about the comet.

It was supposed to bring great peace.

We took our shoes off. It hadn't rained in months—the ground and the air were dry and whenever a bison landed, huge clouds of dust rose into the air. We danced and sang.

Ninang Heping alerted us that, by her calculations, the comet would be coming soon.

We turned over to our backs and we looked at the skies, all of us. Ninang Riza said she worried that the sun, which glowed with incredible intensity that day, would eclipse our view of the comet.

The legend I mentioned, it doesn't exist anymore.

We were told that Yuzhao, the Dragon-God who founded the Fire Nation, was a good man, or a god, or a dragon. He was righteous, but did not trust anybody. After his death (and sanctification), he chose to spend his afterlife guarding the Universe. But even for a Dragon-God, this task was difficult, as there were many worlds, in this legend. It was only every hundred years that he could pass over this world and punish those deserving, leaving no cruel man left under his yellow eyes.

I imagined Yuzhao flying across my sky. Would he see us, all orange and yellow on green? If he knew the cruel, did he know the just? I imagined that he would look upon our field and be pleased. We devoted ourselves to peace.

Yes, he would see our field, like a garden of dahlias and tulips, and he would smile.

We were too busy staring at the sky to notice.

It started off with a scream to get the children back inside. Ninang Riza jumped up and brought me with her; she ordered me to corral them.

I was only ten, but she treated me as an equal.

But I did as I was told, grabbing every tiny hand I could and pulling them back to the temple.

We had no escape plan.

The balloons were red and unmistakable. They rose like I thought only our bison could, and unloaded an army of men.

It hadn't rained in months; everything was very dry.

I was barely halfway back to the temple when I saw the balloons rising over there, too, and the soldiers in every other direction.

I stopped, and it wasn't long thereafter that I lost all the girls I had tried to collect.

It was a mass exodus, of sorts.

Here, I will be completely honest:

I did not know what to do. None of us did. There was too much shouting and too much smoke, and I couldn't think of anything but what my Ninang Riza instructed me to do.

I grabbed a girl, who was small and disoriented, and I held her on my hip, and amidst all the chaos, I ran. I ran low and fast and quiet and scared, and I slipped through the nuns and the soldiers and I did was I was told.

The temple was quiet, and the little girl—I did not know her name—cried silently, the way that children only do when they are really, truly scared.

I set her down somewhere hidden away in the stone and I left, intent on coming back.

I threw up and lied down, and I cried. I didn't cry like the girl, silently.

I wanted someone to hear me. I wanted someone to hear me and to comfort me, and I wanted someone to care.

I imagined Yuzhao flying across my sky. Would he hear me, all curled up and sobbing? Would he be pleased? We devoted ourselves to peace.

I fell asleep, and I awoke to what could have been the Dragon-God's eyes, slanted and yellow, but they found themselves on a wrinkled, gray face, which did not belong to Yuzhao, bringer of peace; it belonged instead to the man whom the world would soon know as the harbinger of war. Sozin, his name was. This was a matter of ceremony.

"The last of your kind," he said to me, and these were the last words I heard, "And you're hiding like a coward."

Ninang Riza said she worried that the sun, which glowed with incredible intensity that day, would eclipse our view of the comet. Perhaps it was too bright even for the Dragon-God.


End file.
